Amphenol’s VIPER™ connector is a shielded, high-density, high-speed press-fit, modular interconnect system. Optimized for differential pair architectures on a 1.8mm x 1.35mm grid, the waferized daughtercard assembly also provides single-ended and power wafer options integrated onto a stainless steel stiffener with stainless steel guidance and keying blocks. The backplane modules are available in 8 and 16 row increments on a 1.8mm x 1.8mm grid, with or without integrated stainless steel guidepin/keys. The new backplane signal contacts incorporate a highly reliable 4-points-of-contact beam design and the ground contacts leverage Amphenol’s 35-year experience with robust compliant pin and contact fork designs. The daughtercard and backplane contacts are stamped using Olin’s high quality C7025 copper alloy and plated using nickel underplate with 50 microinches of gold. Design variations incorporating RF and fiber optic modules into the VIPER™ stiffener assembly are available in addition to the standard 3U and 6U catalog configurations.